Your Damage Done
by HardfacedQueenofMisadventure
Summary: Roger takes a hit, and Mark takes the fall. (Pre-RENT, obviously. Title taken from Placebo's "Song to Say Goodbye".)
1. Now I'm Breaking Down Your Door

**Guess who's back?**

 **I know I've fallen down with my attempts to write multi-chaptered RENT-fics before, and I'm sorry for that. But I thought it was time to try again. Unfortunately, I have no idea where this one is going, mostly because I typed this up in about an hour and a half whilst listening to a bit of Placebo. But I thought I'd post it anyway, and see what you guys thought of it. Beware, it's rather sad :)**

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Mark would be lying if he said he didn't see this one coming.

He knows something is wrong as soon as he enters the loft, the wild, animal heat of outside giving way to something cooler, but somehow more stifling. It's dark and still, but not calm. The atmosphere feels tense, pulled tighter than a drumskin, vibrating in the wake of something he cannot identify.

"Roger?" His voice is high, loud, cracking with anxiety already. _He's gone out. Relax. Breathe. Everything is all right._

But, of course, nothing's all right. Nothing's been _all right_ since the night April killed herself. This evening feels strangely similar; he recognises the tautness of a tragedy about to unfold behind a barred door, and it sends a chill through him despite the heat.

 _Blood in the bathtub. Roger screaming. Sirens. Remember?_ The memory makes him catch his breath, and he has to switch on the lights and look around the room three times to reassure himself that nothing else is happening. Everything is exactly as he left it a few hours ago, except Roger's door is ajar.

 _He always closes it._

 _Unless he's out. He's just gone out, that's all._ But even as he thinks it, he knows it's not true.

"Roger?" he calls again, this time making no effort to conceal the fear in his tone. _He's gone out, he's gone out, he's gone out…_

He turns on the bedroom light, the single, bare bulb flickering a moment before steadying, casting dim yellow-white light through the sparsely-furnished yet still cluttered room. Mark's eyes stray first to all of the familiar details, carefully avoiding the one thing that is out of place.

A small pile of discarded clothes.

Roger's guitar, propped up against the nightstand.

A hole in the wall beside the door.

Sheets strewn about the floor.

 _Look, goddamn you! Look!_

He looks, finally, at the bed. At Roger, lying on his side, breathing in shallow, near-silent gasps. Mark doesn't even need to see the needle cradled between his fingers, or the tiny smear of blood at the crook of one extended arm, to know what's happened.

Mark edges closer when what he should be doing is running for the phone, screaming for help.

Roger's lips are blue, his eyes rolled back to display nothing but eerie white beneath the lids.

There's a cup of water on the nightstand, a spoon, a lighter, a tiny plastic bag.

It is not instinct, but fear that drives Mark's hand to his friend's throat, desperately trying to quell the tremor in his hands for long enough to feel for a pulse. It's weak, like something on the verge of dying, but it is there.

He rolls Roger onto his back, shakes him, hard, watching sickly as Roger's head rolls back and forth in time with his shakes, but he doesn't move or speak or respond. He just lies there, so still he might as well be unconscious, he might as well be -

Mark's mouth is dry, fear tasting the same in the back of his throat this time, like copper, like bile. He doesn't want to look away now he's seen. There's no telling how long Roger's been like this. He could be dying right this second.

 _Dying. Just like April. Another corpse dragged out of this place._

He's out of the room, phone in hand before he's even aware of having moved at all. His name and address trip off of his tongue like songs learnt off by heart, but when he gets to the _nature of his emergency_ his breathing hitches, because this is that other time all over again. The locations and names have all been changed, but he's lived this story before.

 _A blade in the wrist, a needle in the vein, they're all the same, all the same, all the same…_

The voice on the other end of the phone calls his name a third time, and it's only then that he realises he's crying, hard enough to feel an ache in his chest. There's a sound from the bedroom, a choking gasp, an aborted cry, and he's spurred back into action for long enough to explain everything before he collapses again. Sobs becoming gasps, his breathing becoming quicker and hungrier, but only for a moment. It draws away, not completely, but enough to clear his head, enough to let him finish this.

" _Sir? Sir? Someone's coming, please hold on."_ Mark hears the words, and only then does he allow himself to fall to his knees. The phone, locked in his hand like a lifeline, rings off with an atonal-melodic hum. From somewhere within himself, somewhere hidden beneath layers of paralysing terror, he remembers how to unbend his fingers, to let the phone drop.

In the midst of it all, he hears Roger make another sound, more than a gasp, not quite a cry, and somehow he manages to find his feet, to stagger back into the room.

Roger's come round a little; he's nowhere near awake, but his eyes are more open, rolling disjointedly. His fist clenches, loosens around a handful of sheet, again and again.

"Roger," Mark says, like that's all he can manage to say. Roger's frantically-rolling eyes slow, he squints as he tries and fails to focus on Mark's face. His breathing is so shallow it's hardly there at all.

He looks once again at the spent needle between Roger's thin fingers. His nails are bluish-tinted, and Mark has to fight nausea.

A word springs to his mind, and he voices it before he can stop himself.

"Why?" Roger's face contorts in sudden agony, whether at Mark's voice or something else, but Mark cannot feel pity for him. He's too scared for that, still frozen with the sensation of finding him like this.

"Why, Roger?" he husks out again, urgency aggressively dragging the words from his throat.

Roger tries to reply, or maybe to just draw another breath, but instead his eyes roll back and he falls limp, limper somehow than he already was.

His lips are blue, his lips are _fucking blue,_ blue to match the lights reflected onto the far wall through the window, flashing and flashing.

And then there's the grating, metallic sound of the door being shoved open, and there are voices filling the small space like water rising to drown you. Mark manages to hold it together for long enough to watch the EMTs lifting Roger, moving him onto a gurney, not too gently.

Roger makes a small noise in the back of his throat, and no more.

No more.

Mark manages to hold it together for long enough to make it down the stairs, and out into the warm, still, unquiet night. He holds it together until they're both in the ambulance and the door is slammed.

Then, he allows himself to break.

* * *

 **And that's where I'm gonna leave you...**

 **Don't panic, I have actually made a start on the second chapter, and I'll try to publish it as soon as I can. Feedback would be greatly appreciated as always, especially if you have any ideas as to where this story should go. (I sort of want to touch on Roger's withdrawal period, but we'll see...) Thanks for reading!**


	2. Chapter 2

**Back again! Sorry, updates are probably going to be pretty irregular. My inspiration just comes and goes these days :/**

 **Now, I feel that this chapter is actually a lot better than the previous one... not exactly action-packed, I know, but better somehow. I don't know. You tell me :)**

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Part 2

But, surprisingly, it is not fear that rises up to overwhelm Mark, as the floor jolts and judders beneath his feet. Not fear, with its bile-and-blood taste, icy sweat prickling at his hairline and the back of his neck, phantom chills wracking his body, leaving him breathless with his hands and lips tingling.

No, not fear.

Anger.

The force of it is enough to surprise him, leaving him shocked even as his fist drives into the ambulance's door, again and again and again until an EMT can restrain him, but even then his anger doesn't dissipate.

It's enough to leave him trembling, his right hand throbbing with pain and his teeth clenched hard enough to trigger a headache behind his eyes.

 _Why the fuck did you do it, Roger?_

There it is. That question again, the one that neither of them can answer.

 _Why, why, why?_ Bouncing around in his mind like a bullet, ricocheting off of every surface, too fast to stop.

And he's angry, he's so unreasonably, impossibly _angry,_ mad enough to scream, to lash out, to break something just for the satisfaction of watching it shatter, but when Roger's breath hitches behind an oxygen mask and his eyes flash open for the merest of seconds Mark is there, gripping his unresponsive hand like a lifeline.

 _But a lifeline for who?_

Nobody talks to him at all, nobody raises their voice to reassure him that everything's going to be all right, and beneath the thunderhead bloom of anger in his chest and gut, there are icy, sinking fingers of dread. Different to and distinct from the fear, the worry… this is the cold hard certainty that it's all gone wrong.

Not _why_ or _what if,_ but simply _he's dead,_ over and over again like a church bell.

Mark isn't sure at this point which is worse.

They hurry Roger away as soon as they reach the hospital, bursting through doors, speeding down slick white corridors until they reach a point where Mark has to stop. He doesn't want to, he wants to stay with his friend _no matter what,_ but they stop him in his tracks.

"You can't go in there," a doctor who has just joined their ranks says, his voice neutral, stripped of everything but sound. "We'll tell you as soon as we know anything." Just that, that single sentence thrown his way, and then they leave him. Roger, the medics, everyone, they leave him.

 _Alone._

It stops, then. The fear, the rage, the sepulchral dread… all of it stops, leaving him numb.

Mark opens a door, peers into a room with chairs, but there's a child screaming in the corner, cradled tightly by her tearful mother, there are people wracked with every form of pain, talking, shouting, weeping or just sitting in dead-eyed sick silence and Mark can't bear it.

He stumbles away, out into the corridor, but there are so many voices, raised in urgency or speaking in hushed whispers, alarms and telephones ringing, ringing, ringing. He grits his teeth so hard there's a ringing in his head too, but softer somehow, sinks down into a too-low plastic chair and presses his hands to his ears so that's all he can hear. He closes his eyes, folds in on himself, and waits.

Someone brings him a cup of coffee from the machine at the end of the hall. Or he got up to get it himself, he can no longer remember. It's weak, bitter, scalding hot, doing nothing for his throbbing head, but burning his mouth every time he sips. Who knows how much time has passed since he got here? He isn't wearing a watch and the clock on the wall is frozen at twenty to two. Or maybe that's the time. He doesn't know anymore.

His eyes burn, his whole body aches, his knuckles are bloody and split.

This is awful.

Minutes pass, or maybe hours, maybe even seconds _who the fuck knows,_ and a nurse approaches him. She moves slowly, smiling in a way that manages to be genuinely soothing, and for this reason he is able to lift his head and look her in the eye.

"Mark Cohen?" Her voice is similarly soft, it doesn't make him recoil like everything else in the room. He barely remembers to nod before she speaks again. "Mr Davis is stable, for now. We've given him some Naloxone to counteract the drugs in his body, and we've got him on oxygen. It looks like he'll have to stay here for a while, though."

"H—how long?" She shrugs without looking flippant or indifferent.

"It's difficult to say one way or another at this stage. Once the Naloxone does its job, he'll probably go into withdrawal." Mark shivers, knowing this all too well. He's seen Roger without easy access to a hit before; it's not a pretty sight.

"He won't…" His tongue is thick in his mouth, his throat so dry. "He won't want to stay here." The nurse chuckles softly.

"You think any of us are here by choice?" She sighs, smoothes imaginary creases out of her tunic. "You should probably go home. I'd let you stay, but…" He guesses the end of her sentence just from the rueful way the corner of her mouth twists.

 _You're not family._

 _There's no point, anyway. What the hell can you do for him out here?_

Quietening that mutinous little voice, he nods. Murmurs his thanks. Throws the rest of that terrible coffee away, and leaves without even once glancing back.

It's only once he gets outside, out into the cool, smog-laced night air, that he realises how far away from home he is. That he doesn't have his bike. That he didn't pick up his wallet before leaving, not that it would have been much good to him if he had. Dust bunnies and folded-up receipts do not pay for a bus journey.

So Mark buries his hands in his pockets, resigned and weary, and walks.

* * *

 **Poor Mark. Now, I don't know why, but I'm finding it ridiculously interesting to walk around in Mark's head like this...**

 **Many thanks to my lone guest reviewer last chapter, I'm glad you're enjoying the story so far, and I hope you continue to do so.**

 **And, this story is likely to be pretty long, spanning Roger's entire withdrawal period and its impact on the rest of the group (Collins, Benny and Maureen. Should be fun, seeing as I barely utilize those three mostly.) Anyway, please drop me a review and let me know how I'm doing. And if you have any ideas for how to continue this, I'd love to hear them :)**


	3. Chapter 3

**This chapter is shorter than the other two, I'll admit. This is mostly because I'm a little stuck on this fic. There was originally an extra scene at the end, from Roger's perspective, but I didn't feel like it flowed with the rest of the chapter. I might put Roger at the beginning of the next one, though. Enjoy!**

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Maureen is there waiting for him when he finally makes it back. It's past two in the morning and he's _beyond_ fucking tired, he's exhausted to the point where even the grimy floor looks comfortable, and Maureen is there. And somehow, with her make-up smudged everywhere, her hair a tangle and a huge run in her tights from mid-thigh to ankle, she is the most beautiful thing he has seen all night.

She's drunk. He guesses that, if not from her slightly unsteady gait when she walks towards him, then definitely from the fact that she grabs for him and misses by a good centimetre.

"Mark!" she chirps, kissing him swiftly on the mouth before he can process anything else. He can taste alcohol on her breath. "Where have you _been?_ You weren't here when I got back from the club…" She sways a little on the spot and blinks sharply three times before continuing. "And neither was Roger! I was worried…" She pouts with those lush, flawless lips in their smeared lipstick, and then kisses him again. "But you're back now, so that's fine. It's fine." She pats him on the head, and Mark thinks she's so happy in her vodka-shot bubble that he can't bear to tell her, but just thinking about it, now he's home, is enough to bring those tears back to his eyes

She spots them, somehow. Seems to sober up a little at the sight. "Mark? Is everything okay? Are you okay?" Her words run together, slightly panicked before he can even speak.

All he does is shake his head. That's all he can manage because his throat's so damn tight.

"'s Roger," he finally manages, the syllables snagging on each other and tearing. "He overdosed. I just got back…" He breaks off, can't say anymore, physically can't unless he wants to start crying again, which he does not. Maureen embraces him, soft and sincere and gentle now, and he lets himself be held, lets himself cry a little against her shoulder, tries to tell himself that he's imagining the smell of another man's cologne on her collar.

She straightens him up then, delicately. "Oh, baby. I'm so sorry. Is he gonna be all right?" Mark just shrugs; it's too complicated. Will Roger live? Probably. Will he be _all right,_ though, that's not so clear.

The shrug seems to be enough for Maureen. She brightens, if only fractionally. "Go take a bath, baby, I'll make you tea."

He leaves, shuts the bathroom door silently behind him, confronts his reflection in the mirror. He's tear-stained, red-eyed and more tired-looking than he's ever been. He turns both the taps in the tub, and only briefly wonders if they've actually got hot water. He looks at the mirror again, with its spots of rust, the dull patch across the centre where a month ago there had been a message scrawled in lipstick.

He watches the water rising in the bath, remembers it clouded red, remembers the body, head thrown back, eyes open staring staring staring at the cracked ceiling, one arm barcoded with livid red cuts while the other hand still grips a razor blade…

Mark strips hurriedly, shaking his head to clear the images. He dips a foot in the water; it is blessedly warm. He sinks, and tries to forget.

When he comes back, she's made him tea. Kinda. She's found one of his teabags from the back of the cupboard, put it in a mug and poured boiling water on top. The teabag is still in there, floating like a dead thing. His stomach turns. He takes a sip while she watches him eagerly, burning his tongue. He sets the rest down, watches the steam rise and rise until Maureen sits beside him and leans her head on his shoulder. She is warm and soft and drowsy and he remembers how bone-tired he is.

He takes off his jacket and shoes while she does the same, and allows her to guide him backwards until they're lying together, nestled together like the only two spoons in the kitchen drawer. His head aches and the couch is as uncomfy as ever and there's really not enough space for two, and Maureen reeks of alcohol...but he relaxes. He's home now, and everything is going to be okay.

Eventually.

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 **By this point, constructive criticism would be gratefully accepted. So would reviews of any kind, tbh. Please, don't be shy! Tell me what you think, what you like, what you hate and anything you'd like to see next!**


	4. From the Liquid Sky

**I know it's been a while since I last updated this. I'm sorry for that; I've been one busy birdy. This chapter is short, I know, but I hope it makes up for the wait anyway :)**

* * *

 _A rush, orgasmic. Every cell coming alive, lighting up like a Christmas tree. But only for a moment. And then…_

 _Bliss._

 _Body numbed, mind silent, lungs empty, muscles warm and lax and liquid. You don't move; you don't need to. Ever. It's like falling, or you've already fallen, sunk so low that there's nothing around you, not even air, only the darkness… and that's okay._

 _That's okay._

 _Down here, you don't feel the oppressive heat of the room. Down here, you can't see the cracks in the ceiling, the watermarks where the whole place could tumble down around your ears any second. You don't hear the endless mixtape of noise from outside; drunken hollering, car brakes screeching, sirens. You don't care that the fridge is empty except for a biohazardous carton of milk, because you aren't hungry. You need nothing._

 _You don't remember_ her, _dead in a bathtub full of cooling water and blood._

 _You don't remember –_

 _You don't remember that_

WE HAVE AIDS

 _It's just dark, and everything's all right._

 _And then there are hands on your shoulders, shaking you hard, hard, amd you can't move to push them away because you're not there anymore. You are not inside your body, linked to it by only the thinnest thread._

 _The fingers of those hands dig into your shoulders one final time, desperately, and then they are gone._

 _The nothingness returns, for a while. You welcome it, revel in it._

 _And then there are more hands on you, coming from everywhere, they're lifting you, speaking in sounds you can't make sense of. The nothingness is receding, and you try to follow it down, to block everything else out._

 _You are moving. Fast. To where? You don't know, and can't bring yourself to care. When the next wave of soporific oblivion rises to claim you, you fling yourself into it._

 _A cool hand touches your arm. You imagine an angel, faceless, with a soothing voice._

 _And then a pain lights up your arm, and you're pulling in air that you're suddenly starved for. There isn't enough, your lungs have folded in on themselves, you can't get them to work the way they should. Every inch of you prickles: your scalp, your fingertips. Your eyes flash open without your permission, and all you see is white._

 _You wonder, is this death?_

 _You wonder, do you care?_

 _And then something presses over your face, and you breathe. Deeply. It feels like surfacing from deep under water; the light is blinding and the air rushing to fill your chest now is the sweetest thing you have ever tasted._

 _Bliss._

 _And then you remember._

 _You remember_ everything.

Alone and half-conscious in the white hospital room, Roger begins to cry.

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 **Just a brief disclaimer: I have never overdosed on heroin. Or anything else, as a matter of fact, unless you count caffeine. Therefore, I have absolutely no idea how the experience feels. This chapter is probably ridiculously inaccurate in that area, but my goal was to make it somewhat interesting. I used Renton's overdose in _Trainspotting_ as inspiration for some of it, btw. Fantastic movie, if you're in to that sort of thing :)**

 **Now, I have no idea when the next update will come, as I'm kind of stuck at this point. If you have any ideas, please send them my way, along with any other feedback or comments you may have :)**


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